


You're just the torch to put the flame to all our guilt and shame  (and I'll rise like an ember in your name)

by lanyon



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Bucky "Failboat" Barnes, Internalised Homophobia, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-08
Updated: 2013-09-08
Packaged: 2017-12-26 00:07:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/959231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lanyon/pseuds/lanyon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the thirties and in the forties, it made sense to go with girls. That’s all. Bucky could look after himself but he was never gonna advertise anything. It wasn’t a weakness. Just because Steve was all brittle-bones-fragile-skin did not mean that this was a weakness too. </p>
<p>In which old habits die hard and Bucky still goes with girls.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You're just the torch to put the flame to all our guilt and shame  (and I'll rise like an ember in your name)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [what_alchemy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/what_alchemy/gifts).
  * Translation into 中文 available: [你正如火炬 焚尽我们所有的罪与耻 （而我将因你之名 如余烬般重燃而起）](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1479472) by [poppyshen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/poppyshen/pseuds/poppyshen)



> +Firstly, this is for **what_alchemy** as, perhaps, the most-delayed response to the Ao3 Auction. Thank you for bidding for me and I hope you enjoy. It has been a real pleasure getting to know you via email and long may it continue.  
>  + **Warnings** for underage sex, internalised homophobia and Bucky getting things very wrong. It's probably a bit too late to warn for **the longest title ever** but it comes from Jeff Buckley's _Everybody Here Wants You_.  
>  +Huge thanks to **Renne, haipollai** and **beardsley** , as aways, for being the best friends a girl could have, who supported me hugely while writing this and who deal with my shit on a daily basis.

Bucky wakes up, properly wakes up, and there’s something sweet and something sour in the air. The window is open and a gust of hot wind rattles the frame and he knows that he is in Brooklyn and it is the twenty-first century and he is Bucky Barnes. 

His alarm clock rings and vibrates across the bedside locker and he inadvertently crushes it with his left hand and, yes, he is Bucky Barnes. It’s not that he means to be wicked.

He shuffles into the kitchen and Steve is already there, the back of his shirt damp with sweat because God forbid that the dawn get a jump on Steve Rogers. 

“How far did you run today?” he asks, sitting down at the kitchen table, which is a repurposed crate. Stark says it’s hipster chic and Steve says the saleswoman was very convincing about its provenance and about how, somehow, it’s good for the environment. It says _Produce of the USA_ across the side in faded, stencilled letters and it makes Bucky laugh because it’s vintage.

“Fifty,” says Steve and he turns around from flipping pancakes and he must love Bucky very much and Bucky’s heart is flipping too and he reaches out across the tiny kitchen to wrap his fingers around Steve’s wrist. 

“You’ll tire yourself out,” he says.

“Don’t think that’s possible,” says Steve but he smiles when Bucky presses his lips to the soft inside of Steve’s wrist, where there’s a pulse and so much life, and he doesn’t want to think about how exhausted Steve looked when Bucky Barnes emerged from his mist of anger and memories and sharp Cyrillic orders, black letters on white paper.

Bucky’s grip tightens and he pulls Steve down into his lap and he doesn’t even smell the burning pancakes until Steve squirms out of his reach, breathing hard and reproachful and filling out his running shorts in a way that makes Bucky’s mouth water more than breakfast foods.

“How did you sleep?” Steve asks, scraping the pancake remnants into the bin and shoving the pan into the sink. 

Bucky has nightmares, sometimes, wrapped up in Steve’s arms. Maybe they’re memories. He sees his own face and his eyes are fever-bright, like maybe he’s caught one of Steve’s pneumonias. He’s afraid. He knows that much. He’s afraid of losing Steve, to asthma or an aberrant heartbeat or a HYDRA sniper or a New York jail cell because they were caught with their pants down.

He knows that none of these things even exist anymore but it doesn’t stop him from worrying. 

It’s why he makes eyes at the girl sitting across the aisle in the subway car on their way to Manhattan. She drops her gaze and then looks at him again and she’s smiling. He thinks she’s blushing in the flickering clickety-clack of the carriage. He thinks she’s beautiful, in the way that people who aren’t Steve can sometimes be beautiful.

She tucks her hair behind her ear and she brushes by when she gets off the train.

He smiles. It’s not that he’s going to follow her or sleep with her and it’s not that his eyes follow the sway of her hips. It’s that he knows his secret is safe. Steve’s thigh presses against him and Steve’s expression is confused (not hurt, not hurt, not hurt; hurt is when bruises blossomed on the side of his face because he picked another fight, or when breath did not come easy).

Bucky smiles at Steve and Steve smiles back, like it’s a reflex, like it’s all there is. 

“What are we doing today?” he asks. 

Steve shrugs. “Same thing we do every day, I guess.”

Bucky’s not sure that Steve’s happy, at times. Bucky’s not sure that he helps, at times, but it’s not that he means to be wicked.

They walk the dozen or so blocks to the Mansion; they could get a subway that leaves them closer but Steve likes to walk, whether it’s raining or shining or so windy that even the great Captain America staggers a step sideways. 

They walk and there is a foot between them. They are colleagues. They may be friends. Bucky must be a foot apart from Steve or he’ll not think and he’ll reach out and tangle their fingers together. 

They turn right onto Park and wait at the lights. Two women, two businesswomen, dressed in sharp suits and wearing high heels, go their separate ways with a lingering kiss and a promise not to be late home for dinner and Bucky looks at Steve and Steve is nearly frowning. 

“It’s normal now, you see, Buck,” Steve says softly and Bucky feels something squirm inside him. 

Steve’s walking almost before the lights change.

So, they do what they do every day; they sit and they wait in Stark’s shiny tower of glass and metal. There are briefings and meetings and Captain Rogers is always oh-so-busy. At lunch, he presses his hand into Bucky’s and Bucky jerks his hand away. He knows it’s different now but he cannot help it. If someone sees, Steve will be ruined and it doesn’t matter that it’s normal now, you see.

It’s just that they don’t talk about it and they haven’t talked about it since Bucky got back. Bucky doesn’t know what Nick Fury’s band of merry men know about Steve and his lips are sealed because everything that he knows about Steve; the way his breath frosted the air in winter eighty years ago and the way his legs were blue in the Coney Island surf, even in the middle of summer and the way his fingers, slender and callused and charcoal smeared, would glide over the back of Bucky’s hand; all of it belongs to Bucky and he’s never been good at sharing. He does not mean to be wicked.

.

He has concussion or that’s what they’re trying to tell him. His head hurts, sure enough, and the room is spinning in an entirely inconsistent fashion. 

“Tell us about your first kiss, Barnes.”

“ _Tony_ -”

Here’s the secret: Bucky’s half-way to unconsciousness and he knows that Steve likes Tony some days and barely tolerates him most days and right now? Right now, Steve’s probably contemplating knocking Tony’s head against the wall. 

“C’mon, Cap, where’s your sense of scientific curiosity? Makes a change from asking who the goddamned President is, which, spoiler, by the way? Is not a Bush.”

“ _Tony_ -”

“It’s not like I’m asking him for the password to his goddamned email account.”

(The thing, oh, the thing is, Bucky remembers his first kiss. He’s sixteen years old and Steve is twenty and he’s got this fuzz on his cheeks and on his upper lip that he’s so goddamned proud of and that Bucky just wants to run his tongue over and they’re both drunk on some kinda moonshine that Bucky liberated from Sister Rose’s study. 

“Practice,” says Bucky, breathing hard against Steve’s cheek. It’s easy to call it practice in Steve’s tiny studio, with thin curtains that do nothing to keep the light out. Bucky’s supposed to be back in the orphanage but he’s sixteen and the nuns can’t keep him there for ever. 

“Maybe I could move in,” says Bucky. “Help with the rent.” He kisses Steve’s collarbone, sharp and jutting beneath pale skin. “Help you practise some more.”

Steve smiles and it’s always so glorious when he smiles and it reaches his eyes. Bucky kisses Steve’s eyelids. Steve’s fingers curl around Bucky’s wrists and Bucky laughs and presses him down to the cot in the corner of the room; he spreads him out and pins him down, like one of those butterflies in the window of the antiques shop on Atlantic Avenue. 

“Is it?” asks Steve, later, in a soft whisper that barely stirs the damp hair at Bucky’s temple. “Is it practice?”

The thing is, Steve’s an artist and he moves in circles where maybe this is normal and Bucky doesn’t want it ever to be normal. He wants to keep Steve here and safe because the NYPD’s nothing like the bullies in the orphanage; they aren’t gonna back down at the sight of Bucky’s scarred knuckles. 

“‘course not,” says Bucky, because moonshine and sex make him brave. “‘course it’s not but we can’t let anyone else know.”

See, Bucky’s got the street smarts and Steve’s a dreamer but it’s okay ‘cause Bucky’s gonna keep him safe and it’s not that he means to be wicked.)

Bucky forces his eyes open and Steve is glaring at Tony and Bucky has to laugh. He closes his eyes again and smiles. 

“Her name was Mildred Donovan-”

.

In the thirties and in the forties, it made sense to go with girls. That’s all. Bucky could look after himself but he was never gonna advertise anything. It wasn’t a weakness. Just because Steve was all brittle-bones-fragile-skin did not mean that this was a weakness too. Just because Steve’s cock was made for sucking and his mouth was made for kissing did not mean that it was a weakness. Bucky told himself that, over and over. 

So he went with Mildred and Jenny Bryce let him feel her up under her sweater and Ruby was his steady for eight months. 

Steve knew, though. Steve knew why Bucky had to do it.

.

Bucky’s grounded and bored and Steve says they should go down to Coney Island. Tony overhears and then the whole gang are invited and Ms Potts and Miss Lewis are SHIELD-sanctioned superhero-wranglers and Bucky tries not to interpret Steve’s expression as one of disappointment. 

On the subway, he leans in and whispers, “It’ll be fun. Coney’s always fun when it’s you and me.”

Steve smiles at him and Bucky pretends that he can’t feel the backs of Steve’s fingers against his thigh and he looks at Natalia, pretty in black and red and deep in conversation with Ms Potts and the lights flicker as the train pulls out of the darkness and if Bucky half-closes his eyelids, they’re translucent and everything is tinted pink.

(Steve's skin is almost translucent. There's no one but Bucky to see him in the Coney Island surf. It's 6am and mid-July and 1939. There's no one but Bucky to see the way Steve's bones slide under his skin or the way Steve's legs are blue-and-purple or the way he's laughing.

Steve can see, though, and his expression changes.

“Bucky, no.”

“There’s no one here,” says Bucky. 

It’s not that Bucky thinks that Steve’s a girl but, sometimes, he thinks Steve might pass. Sometimes, he thinks he might like to take Steve dancing; dress him up in a fancy frock, roll nylons up his calves and coax his feet into heels. Steve can’t dance, though, and resists all of Bucky’s attempts to teach him in the quiet of their apartment.

He’d like to press Steve down in the sand, wriggling and laughing. He settles for a brush of lips, and a whisper of fingertips against Steve’s thigh, in the shade of the bath house that neither of them care to pay for.)

“Bucky, wake up.” Steve nudges him and the oaf has pointy elbows; no matter how much muscle he’s carrying, he’s always had pointy elbows. “We’re here.”

Bucky blinks and twists his head and he can see the Cyclone and he laughs because it’s still standing. 

They walk out of the station and Nathan’s is still on the corner and Ms Potts tells him that Hurricane Sandy did some damage but they’re pulling themselves up and Bucky smiles ‘cause to him? It’s still Coney. 

“Remember when you -”

“Threw up on the Cyclone, yeah, buddy,” says Steve and gooseflesh ripples across Bucky’s arms like someone’s just walked over his grave. 

“Shit, how many hot dogs had you eaten?” asks Clint and Steve laughs as they walk past the leaderboard and Bucky blinks because who in the hell can eat sixty-nine hot dogs? 

“One,” says Steve. “Well. We shared it.”

Bucky slings his arm around Steve’s shoulders. “He was a delicate flower back then,” he says and Steve leans against his side and Bucky’s lungs are full of sea air and memories. 

“I’ll show you delicate,” and Steve’s laugh is a deep rumble and he shoves Bucky away and says, “Last one to the boardwalk buys the funnel cakes,” and he’s sprinting away and Bucky can do nothing more and nothing less than sprint after him, even to the sound of Tony Stark’s laughter. 

“Christ, these guys have come back to their spiritual home. The wholesomeness is killing me.”

Bucky flips Tony the bird without breaking stride and he chases the sound of Steve Rogers’ laughter. 

The day is a good day. It’s a fucking good day and Steve is happy which generally makes Bucky _so_ happy and they’re on the F on their way back to Manhattan. 

“So, you guys used to go there a lot?” asks Stark. It’s always Stark with his insatiable, not-scientific curiosity. It’s always Stark.

“When we could afford it, yeah,” says Steve.

“Just the two of you? That’s all cosy, isn’t it?”

Bucky bristles, the way he always does when someone inches close to his truth.

Steve just smiles and it’s soft and a little sad. “Well, y’know, the ladies weren’t lining up and Bucky was pretty much my only friend.” He nudges Bucky and, this time, Bucky stands up. He can feel Steve’s eyes on him but Stark is inching closer and closer. 

“If it wasn’t for Bucky,” Steve says softly, “I’d prob’ly never have left the house. Except for work.”

“And to get in fights,” says Bucky, his voice gruff and rough. 

Steve stands up, too. “Next stop is Bergen. We can get the G-”

“No,” says Bucky. He know it’s abrupt. “Let’s go up to the Tower. It’s been a while since we’ve gone out on the town.”

“Oh,” says Steve, uncertain. “Oh, okay. Sure.”

 

Bucky tries not to look at Steve’s face because he hates to disappoint him. Before, when they were young and war was a distant rumour and a gathering cloud, they used to go out. It was to keep up appearances.

It is still to keep up appearances. 

When they get to the Tower, they go to Steve’s floor and, same as always, Stark says he can build a new floor for Bucky except he’s not sure that the antediluvian codependency will allow it. Stark’s full of shit except when he worries too close to the bone. 

Steve showers and he still shouldn’t look tired because they’ve spend the day in Coney Island and, okay, Bucky didn’t get to lick sugar off Steve’s fingers, like he used to fantasise about back in the day, and they didn’t share a caramel apple or an iced lemonade, but it’s been a good day. 

Steve’s got a towel wrapped around his hips, one of those thick, luxurious soft towels that are always in plentiful supply in the Tower and he’s thoughtful and he walks over to Bucky, who hasn’t showered yet, who can still feel Coney Island sand between his toes. Steve drops his towel and then he drops to his knees and Bucky - well, Bucky doesn’t understand. 

Steve unbuckles Bucky’s belt and unbuttons his jeans and slides them down, just so, over Bucky’s hips. He presses a kiss to the jut of Bucky’s hip and Bucky - well, Bucky doesn’t understand.

They are going out tonight, with the rest of the team, and maybe Steve will meet a girl and maybe he’ll meet his right partner but he is licking Bucky’s cock like it is all he needs (it is all Bucky needs) and Bucky can only faintly hear the moans dripping off his own lips as he presses his head back against the solid wall. 

Steve swallows; he always does, as though he cannot stand to let anything go to waste and when he stands up, he draws the back of his hand over his swollen red mouth and it is only when he walks away that Bucky realises they haven’t kissed for hours or days.

.

The club probably belongs to Stark by now. Bucky is on the dance floor, sandwiched between two women, and Steve is at the bar, facing away from the club and his shoulders are hunched. 

“Excuse me, ladies,” Bucky shouts, over the deep, throbbing bass, and he slips away and they don’t seem to notice his absence. 

He sits up next to Steve and leans against him. “Try not to have too much fun, pal,” he says and Steve is doodling on a beermat. He offers Bucky a distracted smile. 

“You know it’s not really my scene, Buck,” he says. 

“Then why’d you come?” asks Bucky. It comes out harsher than he intends. 

“You know,” says Steve. “The team that plays together or whatever it was Clint was trying to say-” He gestures weakly. “You - you’re having fun, though, right? Those girls are awfully pretty-”

It’s not that Bucky means to be wicked but he glances over his shoulders and grins at them. “They’re something, aren’t they? Paige is an actress and Sage is a med student-”

“That’s swell, Buck - why don’t you? I mean, looks like they’re missing you.” 

Bucky feels an irrational surge of annoyance with Steve. He doesn’t know what he wants Steve to do or say but sitting here at the bar of a crowded nightclub, trying to make himself small and unnoticeable, is not it.

He goes home with Paige and Sage. It turns out to be a mistake.

.

He wakes up in Medical two days later. He doesn’t want to open his eyes and so he doesn’t. It’s just his luck; in a club containing Tony Stark and Clint Barton and Bruce Banner, somehow _he_ is the attraction for a pair of disgruntled ex-SHIELD agents. From what he’s overheard, Paige and Sage (and he doubts those are their _real_ names), were about to embark on a detailed vivisection before Steve burst in. 

Apparently, they had succeeded in detaching his left arm and he can feel its absence.

“So, his blood results are back,” says Stark. “No poison, no change in the - uh - constituents of his cells or what have you. Your boy’s probably gonna live for ever, Cap. I mean, provided he improves his taste in women.”

“He’ll find the right one,” says Steve, softly. 

“Why so sad, Cap? You don’t wanna be cool Uncle Steve?”

“Always,” says Steve, almost too quickly. “Guess I never thought I’d live that long, though.”

“Well, good news! You guys are gonna outlive us all.” 

Stark’s phone rings and he’s answering it and walking out the door before Bucky has time to react. His eyes flutter open. Steve is standing there, his hand over his own eyes. 

“Jesus, Buck,” he says, softly. “Why don’t you pick someone who loves you?”

Steve is turning and leaving and Bucky blurts out, “No-” and Steve stops in the doorway. 

“I can’t give you what you want, Steve,” says Bucky. He’s listing a bit to the left, to the absence and he pulls the sheet up to his chin. “I’m not what you want.”

Steve turns around to face Bucky. “You - you always were the one who understood me best.”

Bucky’s heart sinks. 

“But I guess you’ve taken too many knocks on the head over the years to remember-”

“Rem-remember what, Steve?”

“Remember that you were always what I wanted, once I knew what wanting was.”

(They are orphans and they do not know what _want_ is, only need. Bucky’s eight and he’s sitting in a cold classroom and they are drawing what they love, and that is even harder than want, and Sister Assumpta asks what Bucky’s drawn, and there is his grandmother and his sister and there is Steve, who he thinks he loves best.

“Like a brother,” says Sister Assumpta, turning away. “There is little that is stronger than brotherly love, unless it is the love we have for our Heavenly Father-”)

.

Bucky goes home and home is Brooklyn. It will be a few days before his new arm will be ready and he wonders what Tony Stark can achieve in a few days (and he suspects it will be beyond his wildest imaginings). 

Steve is quiet. He does not sit next to Bucky on the subway, instead sitting opposite Bucky, staring into space. 

They spend an evening in torturous silence and just when Bucky is about to say something, Steve turns to him.

“I’m sorry,” he says. It’s not what Bucky is expecting. “I’ve put you in an awful position and I’m sorry.” He’s not looking Bucky in the eye, not even when Bucky reaches out and wraps his fingers around Steve’s wrist. 

“What do you mean?” asks Bucky. He looks down at the couch cushions. 

“I - I know. You’ve always been good to me, Buck. Even when you didn’t need to. You’ve always -” Steve swallows. He tugs his wrist gently out of Bucky’s grip. “You don’t owe me anything, Bucky. I think I just got carried away when I saw how it could be -”

Bucky feels helpless. “Buddy, I have _no_ idea what you’re saying.”

“I know, I know.” Steve touches his lips to Bucky’s forehead. “I love you. I know it’s not what you want. I mean, you really didn’t need to get kidnapped by a pair of women to prove it.”

Oh, god. When Bucky looks up, Steve is trying to smile and it’s the single most heartbreaking expression Bucky’s ever seen on anyone’s face. 

“I know _I’m_ not what you want and that’s okay.”

“Wait. What?” Bucky blinks, feeling foolish, feeling like he’s missed a step, or a conversation, or a confession. “I - I’m sorry, pal but if you think you’re not what I want, you’re the idiot here-”

Steve lips twitch but his eyes are still so sad. “I -” He sits back and pushes his fingers through his hair. “No, Bucky. I’m - no. You’re - you’re the one who goes with girls- You _want_ to go with them-”

“No, Steve,” says Bucky, frantic, now, and off-balance as he rests his hand on Steve’s shoulder, his thumb gliding up Steve’s throat. “No, I don’t think you - I did it for _you_ -”

Steve’s expression shuts down and that’s even worse than the sadness. “For me?” 

“To keep you safe-”

“ _Safe_?” asks Steve. “From - from what? From _you_? From-”

“I-” Bucky swallows. “Steve, I love you.”

“Don’t say it just because I did, Buck.” 

“But I wanted to keep you safe from people talking about you-”

“ _Talking_ about me? And saying what? ‘Captain America is in love with a man’? My god, Bucky, people _talking_ about me is the least of my worries.” 

When Steve puts it like that, it sounds - it sounds silly.

“You don’t need to spare my feelings, you know that, right? You’re still my best friend even if -”

“-even if I’m a fucking idiot?”

“I just. Wish you weren’t embarrassed by us, that’s all,” whispers Steve. “I wish I didn’t embarrass you.”

It’s not right. They’re not going to put it right with cuddles on the couch, in front of Steve’s improbably large flatscreen television. Bucky can’t suddenly reach for Steve’s hand in public or kiss him breathless when he comes home safe. He can tell the girls that there’s someone else, even if he thinks he can’t say he’s gay, not yet. 

.

“I’m gay,” he says to Stark, who’s attaching his left arm, using only expensive bourbon as anaesthetic. 

“Sure,” says Stark, sounding bored and unimpressed. “And you’re just head over heels in love with our glorious leader.” 

“More than I can say,” says Bucky, on a sigh. 

“Listen, Barnes, I’m strictly maintenance. You want a confidant, you go to Bruce. He’s much better at listening to homosexual crises than I am.”

“It doesn’t bother you?”

“That you and Cap have been bumping uglies since the Great Depression? Yeah, no.”

“Do you think it bothers anyone else?”

“Only Cap’s groupies and the Westboro Baptist Church, I’d imagine,” says Stark. He taps Bucky’s arm with a wrench. “You’re good to go, Friend of Dorothy. Tin man to tin man, go get your guy. Just be careful with the repulsor technology.”

Bucky’s pretty sure that Tony’s not being entirely politically correct but he’s also pretty sure that he’s being honest. 

He stands up and circles his shoulder and the movement is smooth and painfree. “Thanks, Stark.” 

He grins at Stark’s pretty intern, who blushes so prettily. 

“I gotta go see about a guy-”

He hears Stark talking to her. “Don’t worry, Science Girl. The best ones are always gay.”

“I know,” she says. “Including my girlfriend.”

. 

Bucky’s got his feet on Steve’s coffee table. Steve walks in and raises one eyebrow. It’s not that Bucky means to be wicked and he pulls Steve down on top of him and revels in a world in which boots on furniture is the bigger sin.


End file.
